Effectively conveying time-based data often requires creating charts and graphs that are easily understood and appreciated. In today's business world, a superior presentation of data may greatly impact a business's performance. The primary purpose of a graph is to quickly communicate information to an intended audience. An effective graph conveys information to a viewer in a clear, well-designed and unambiguous manner. Thus, an effective graph has meaningful labels, clear axis marks, organization, and is uncluttered. The success of graph often depends upon whether the graph and its labels are aesthetically pleasing.
Graphs and charts are used in a variety of fields, such as finance, e-commerce, communications, consulting, accounting, law, marketing, sales, etc. More and more these businesses are having to deal with a large influx of data and they must find a way to quickly and effectively communicate the data. As data becomes more available businesses need an automated process to create comprehendible graphs and charts. This need is most acute when handling time based data because, time units have unusual variations and particularities. Thus, an automated process that converts time based data into an elegantly labeled graph is needed.
The automated labeling of a time axis is one of the most challenging components of any charting software. Commercially available charting software does not automate the labeling of the time axis in a way that is visually pleasing. For example, many spread sheet packages only use a single line of text to label the time axis. The resulting chart is cluttered and has redundant labels. In contrast, leading business publications employ multi-line labeling of the time axis in their presentation graphics. However, these labels are not automated and require human operators (e.g. graphic artists) to perform the layout manually. Thus, the general problem is finding a method to elegantly and automatically label a chart or a graph with a time axis for any time unit.